Sweet
Colonel Sweet was the Monitor (commander) of the Eternal Guard during The White Rose. Like all Monitors before him, his sworn duty was to ensure that the Dominator remained trapped in his subterranean prison. He was constantly on guard about the potential regrowth of a new cell of Resurrectionists, who would seek to free the Dominator. Before The White Rose Like the rest of the Guard, Colonel Sweet was permanently stationed near the Barrowland in the Great Forest. But before this, he was a regular in one of the armies of the Lady's Empire. In that capacity he fought in the campaign against the Rebel at the giant city of Rust. In one harrowing event, he witnessed civilians commit suicide to avoid capture, and would later recall the event as follows: Sweet became Monitor sometime after Croaker left the Barrowland in Shadows Linger. The Monitor who preceded Sweet, whose name was not recorded in the Annals, became very acquainted with Croaker over a period of at least 5 weeks before the Company went to Juniper. ''The White Rose'' As Monitor, Sweet became friends with "Corbie", an educated man who did menial wage labor for Sweet's Guard subordinates. Sweet appreciated Corbie's presence, often playing chess with him, drinking brandy, and discussing their soldiering past. The Monitor had no idea Corbie was Raven, a former member of the Black Company who was trying to ingratiate himself to Darling, the leader of the new Rebel movement. One of the new Taken arrived for a surprise inspection of the Eternal Guard and their community. At the top of the Taken's list of suspicious persons was Corbie, who often wandered around at night. Colonel Sweet mentioned this to Raven, but he did not uncover the truth. When Raven assumed his disembodied spirit form, his foolhardy tinkering inside the Barrowland damaged the enchantments containing two of the Dominator's demons, Toadkiller Dog and Tracker. The pair of demons escaped and Raven's spirit was trapped in their stead. This caused a terrifying mega-storm to suddenly brew over the Barrowland. Colonel Sweet and his men charged out to investigate, convinced that the ruckus was the Dominator escaping. They were unable to figure out what happened despite hours of searching, since neither Tracker nor Toadkiller Dog left any tracks. They assumed it was just inexplicable weather when the storm suddenly subsided. Colonel Sweet personally investigated the situation when Corbie was found in a comatose state. The limited insights of Case (Sweet's subordinate who was Corbie's friend) and the horse doctor Holts were insufficient to help them realize that Raven's soul was trapped outside his body. Case informed Colonel Sweet that Corbie wanted a special letter delivered to a blacksmith in Oar in the event of his death. He also told the Monitor that Corbie wanted to warn him that the Dominator was stirring beneath the ground. Sweet was frightened and sent Major Klief to arrest the blacksmith to get more answers. Colonel Sweet later had Croaker, One-Eye, Goblin, and Tracker arrested and imprisoned after (accurately) sensing something was off about the newcomer "traders". After Tracker (a demon disguised as a regular man) clobbered some of Sweet's Guardsmen, the Monitor had them all herded into the cellar beneath the Eternal Guard headquarters, into a room which was setup to look like an intimidating torture chamber. Sweet interrogated Croaker, but the disguised Black Company physician refused to explain their genuine purpose. He ordered that One-Eye be tied to the rack, but relented when One-Eye and Goblin put on a bizarre and hideous show of sorcery illusions. After Sweet surrendered, he and the Guardsmen with him were sealed in the cellar by the Black Company group. One-Eye collapsed the building on top of them, and they were presumed killed. Later, after the Lady and Darling created an alliance between the Empire and the Rebel, Sweet reappeared with a gimp leg. Croaker was surprised to see he had survived the building's collapse after all. Sweet is not mentioned again in the Annals, but he almost certainly participated in the Battle of the Barrowland against the Dominator. He might have been among the "scores" of Guardsmen killed by the Dominator's first air burst spell or during the actual combat. If he survived the battle, he may have been among the remaining Guardsmen wiped out by the Limper, Toadkiller Dog, and their small force of forest tribesmen who swept through the Barrowland, taking no prisoners, in The Silver Spike. Category:Characters Category:Imperials Category:Eternal Guard